head to cnn.com/sotu. for analysis and extras if you missed any part of today's show find us on itunes, search "state of the union." fareed zakaria is next for our viewers here in the united states. this is "gps, the global public square." welcome to all of you in the united states and around the world. i'm fareed zakaria. we have two famous and fascinating guests for you today. first, the world's second wealthiest man, bill gates. despite the weak economy, despite the strife in molly, syria, else where, despite massacres and messed up weather, gates says he is optimistic about the future. he'll tell us why. and the vice president turned businessman/thinker/filmmaker/ environmental activist, al gore, on american politics, gun control, climate change and much more. coming up. also, did you have more

money in your bank account this week than a major african nation? probably. i'll explain. but, first, here's my take. the scenes of chaos and strife in egypt that you've been seeing during the second anniversary of the tahrir square uprising. are just the latest and most vivid illustration that egypt's revolution is going off the rails. it has revived talk about the failure of the arab spring and even some nostalgia for the old order. but let's remember, that old order was doomed. arab dictators like hosni mubarak could not have held on to power without even greater troubles. look at syria. # but events in the middle east the last two years do underscore something i have long believed that constitutions should take precedence over elections. let me explain. look at the difference between egypt and jordan. at the start of the arab spring, it appeared that egypt responded

to the will of the people, made a clean break with its past and was ushering in a new birth of freedom. jordan, by contrast, had a number of protests, but king abdullah responded with only a few personnel changes and promised to study the situation and talk of reform. but then egypt started going down the wrong path and jordan made a set of wise choices. put simply, egypt shows democratization. before liberalization. elections became the most important element of the new order. used in legitimizing the new government, electing a president and ratty fiing the constitution. as a result, the best organized force in egypt, the muslim brotherhood swept into power and was able to dominate the drafting of the constitution. the document has many defects. it failed to explicitly protect women's rights. it allowed for media censorship in the name of national security, and in november morsi declared his decrees were above

judicial review. in jordan, by contrast, the king did not rush to hold elections and was widely criticized for his deliberate pace. instead, as he explained on this program last week, he appointed a counsel to propose changes to the constitution. in september 2011, the council transferred some of the king's powers to parliament and established an independent commission to administer elections. those elections held just ten days ago were boycotted by jordan's muslim brotherhood on the grounds that changes were too small and power still resided with the king. but 70% of eligible voters registered and 56% turned out at the polls, the highest turn out in the region. many critics of the king and government were elected. 12% of the winners were opposition islamist candidates, thanks to a quota that the commissioner had set 12% of the new parliament members are women.

king abdullah ii retains authority, but the new system is clearly a step in a transition to a constitutional monarchy. morocco has taken a similar route as jordan in acting constitutional reforms in 2011, as well. on the other hand, the arab world's two largest experiments in democracy, iraq and egypt, have unfortunately made poor choices in common. both placed elections ahead of constitutions, popular participation ahead of individual rights. both have had, as their first elected leaders, strong men with islamist backgrounds who have no real dedication to liberal democracy. the results have been the establishment of illiberal democracy in iraq and the danger of a similar system in egypt. the best role models for the region might well be two small monarchies, although much more reform is needed in both places. but, basically, jordan and morocco have chosen evolution over revolution. so far, it seems the better course.

for more on this, go to cnn.com/fareed for a link to my "washington post" column. let's get started. bill gates is the richest man in america and the second richest man in the world. this, despite having already given away $28 billion. gates has just released his annual letter detailing what the bill and melinda gates foundation has accomplished in the past 12 months, but he also gives his surprising take on the state of the world. bill gates, welcome back. >> good to be here. >> everybody worries. you talk to people and they feel things are going badly. politically, economically. you in your annual letter, you talk a lot about the good news. so, cheer us up. tell us what is the stuff that you think is most heartening about the world today? >> well, through innovation life is getting better at a really amazing rate.

one of the statistics i think is kind of a report card for the world is how many children under the age of 5 die every year. and back in 1960, it was over 20 million. by 1990, came down to 12 million and now, we're on track by 2015, to be half of that. less than 6 million. that's the greatest rate of decrease we've ever seen. now it's vaccines, it's better nutrition. we are making progress against these very tough problems. and i think it's partly because bad news happens kind of all of a sudden and good news is a little bit at a time. even the empowerment of the internet, one little thing at a time. you could miss, you could almost thing people are saying life is better beforehand which is not even close to being true. >> what would you say to somebody, an american who says, yeah, this is great. but we're going through this terrible economic crisis and things look pretty grim for the

united states? >> well, it's not -- i don't want to understate the challenges that people have, but the kind of goods that people have in learning on the internet and how you get, things have improved a lot in the last 20 years. there are places where we don't have market mechanisms. in health care and education, as we've gotten rich, those are bigger parts of the economy and our ability to use normal, private sector things to work in those areas is very, very weak. 95% of teachers are never given any feedback. never told, hey, you do this well, but you should work on this. go over and see how some other teacher calms the classroom down or makes a complex subject interesting. and i think if we bring feedback systems, which means measuring and telling people how they're doing, we bring that into areas

like teaching, we can get more out of the education investments that we make. >> but you think that because of technology and that kind of thing, americans today have many more opportunities in some sense than they had before? >> that's right. if you just take median income and say that means we haven't had this big improvement. >> which hasn't changed in the last 25 years. >> that really understates what's happened. i mean, would you rather be a gay man 20 years ago, 50 years ago? in africa and gdp didn't go up, but life spans almost doubled. literacy went from 20% to 60% we don't capture all the wonderful things. i can use wikipedia for free and i can sit there with my son and explore new things. and, so, innovation is being underestimated today more than any time in history.

i mean, we had the internet bubble where it was actually briefly overestimated. that was kind of uncomfortable, i think, but it's strange to be in such a funk because people look at political roadblock and some of the way that these numbers measure things and they aren't getting a sense of the progress in the rich world and in the developing world. >> but when you look at washington and you look at the political gridlock, you must get very depressed. >> yes, i'm no expert on politics but i know that, you know, the countries face many challenges in the last several hundred years and somehow democracy has been self-correcting. that is, eventually, democracy has particularly in the u.s. has always found its way there. now, running a government with a two-month budget, you know, try to run a business. try to hire people and try to do capital spending and try to figure out how you're going to use innovation. it's -- no matter what you think

about what the government wants it to be, doing it the way we're doing it is absolutely insane. terribly inefficient. every bad thing you can say about government gets worse when it's on the short term, unknown future processes. >> on the big public policy issue of the day, we should involve economic policy and i'm asking you this because you found it and ran for many years the largest company in the world. the issue is, do we need to get the fiscal house in order with a long-term budget deal and would that trigger a kind of avalanche of business investment? is that what is holding businesses back? >> certainly the uncertainty that we haven't reached compromises on these things, that can't be good. it's got to make business hold back. the fact that the investments in the future may be cut back, that's a little bit scary. are people really saying that the medical research budget should be cut? >> which is on track to be cut?

>> well, yeah. sequestration is this kind of across-the-board thing. should you plan for that or not plan for that? say you're a graduate student right now, money for your lab, not money for your lab? really awful to not, to not make decisions. i'm not a macro economics person. clearly there's this global almost evaluation where everybody is trying to get their currency to be worth less which is quite unusual, which has business standing on the sidelines a bit in terms of their capital spending and you'd like to unlock that. it's one of the big pools of money that's out there. when we come back, bill gates tells us he thinks he knows what makes a great teacher. an answer to an age-old question, when we come back. transitions® lenses automatically filter just the right amount of light. so you see everything the way it's meant to be seen. maybe even a little better. visit your eyecare professional today

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we are back with bill gates. bill, you have spent a lot of time. your foundation, you spent a lot of money on trying to alleviate poverty and deal with issue of disease and things like that. but then you also spend a lot of money on education. up with of the -- and i remember in previous conversations we've had on the show, you said that you have determined that the most important thing in fixing an education system is getting good teachers. that is more important than

class size, curriculum, than anything. but then that left the question of what is a good teacher, can you figure it out and can you replicate it? >> well, it's amazing that the difference between the very best teachers and the ones that are the worst, is incredible. even from the best to the average is a dramatic difference. and, yet, we don't really look into why that good teacher is so good and try and capture it so that we can help the average teacher move up to, say, the top. if we did that, we'd have the best education system in the world. but our teachers get the least feedback. over 95% are never told what they're doing well, what they're not doing well. and it just doesn't drive excellence to not know where you -- what you need to work on. # you know, in baseball we're serious. we tell you all your statistics.

in baseball, why should we measure that and be so much hard core rather than education. which is the very basis of the economy. >> what is it that makes a good teacher. it turns out the way you engage the class is a critical difference. so, an average person, an average teacher comes in and only through research, we know this. they pretty much know what they're going to present during that class. and looking at the students and seeing if they're sort of fidgeting, moving their leg, a lack of energy in the room. going in and asking them questions and getting them engaged and seeing if they like the topic, the best teacher is very interactive. it's more performance oriented. i think it's fantastic that we're finally getting to the bottom of why are those amazing people so good. we're not saying we can get everybody to the very top, but

at least we can do a lot, a lot better and it only costs about 2% of the salary base to put these observers, surveys, statistics gathering together and that is a fantastic investment. >> tell me about another trend that is sweeping education or has just begun. these massively online courses, where what i'm struck by is you have the ability now because stanford and mit are putting all their courses online and harvard putting all its courses online and everyone else will probably follow suit that you have the ability to now take courses in an interactive fashion because they're designing them pretty well with interactive software and you could be taught physics by basically the best physics teacher in the world. that feels like it should have a massive elevating effect on education. >> i'm very excited about this. the fact that the online can be personalized, the best lecturer

and great interactive demos. absolutely. we're going to revolutionize education. but it may take a while for all the pieces to come together. maybe five years. our foundation is the biggest backer of these activities. putting course videos online and mit open course and others almost nobody used that because they would get confused, they would get stuck and that was the problem with the course. and they wouldn't get the degree. and today that degree is what the employer values. so, the number of people who take hard courses where there's not a degree benefit for them, that's pretty small. the elite students who have been the early consumers of these things even they have had pretty high dropout rates. so, but, enough people are using these things that we're in a process where they're just going to get better and better. so, i am, i am very enthused about what's in the years ahead.

>> what about the institutional blockages that people talk about some of the education issues. the teacher unions and things. how big a problem is that? do you think if you really could have vouchers and charter schools and all the stuff much more responsive to new trends and market demands that education would be transformed much more quickly? >> k through 12, almost everybody goes to a local school. universities are a bit different because kids actually do pick a university. the bizarre thing is, though, the merit of a university is actually how good the students going in are. the s.a.t. scores of the children going in. >> we have no measure going out. >> exactly. the best university is one whose bulletin board should read we take kids with the lowest s.a.t. scores and they're making $100,000 a year. so we're completely missing the right thing. so, what happens is kids don't

want courses to be so hard. so the amount of time you spend in class or working on your studies has gone down over the last few decades. and universities have competed to have these very elite students, partly competed by nonclassroom, you know, restaurants, climbing walls, things like that, so we're in a bad pattern that you get this paradox that if you want unemployment in the u.s. to go down, it's not just cyclical, college graduates, we're below 4%, and new job creation will favor college graduates more in the future than in the past. so, you've got to get a higher percentage of the people through a strong four-year degree. but the costs are going up and the amount of money, state money is going down because it's going to health. federal money, assume the best cases it gets plateaued and it's going up a lot over the last decade and it won't be able to keep doing that.

>> but it does sound like because of this ability to figure and measure teachers because of these new technologies, we may be at an inflection point in education. you're just going to see a massive uptick in productivity. >> that's right. as soon as you can bring market-type things where you measure, give feedback and identify best practices, then innovation becomes, you know, very pervasive. in particular, when you have technology and there's so many ways you use technology, the measurement of the students and teachers. this is a very important time to get that right. and that's why i love the fact that students' surveys that are so easy to do are very diagnostic. the students have a lot that their feedback can indicate to a teacher where they need to improve their practice. >> all right. wonderful to hear some optimism. >> i'm very optimistic. great to see you. >> we will be back. for those nights

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now for our what in the world segment. zimbabwe's finance minister made a disclosure this week.

he told reporters that his government had very little money left in its public account. 217 u.s. dollars to be exact. no, not 217 million or billion. 217 dollars. zimbabwe has made these kind of headlines before. at one point in 2008, annual inflation hit an estimated 90 sextillion percent. that is the number 9 followed by 22 zeros. the central bank was forced to print a 100 trillion note which now sells on ebay for a few u.s. dollars. but once zimbabweans adopted u.s., the economy stabilized. according to the international monetary fund, gdp grew by more than 6% in 2009 and nearly 10% for each of the next two years. it is now projected to grow around 5% per year through 2014. so, despite the seemingly robust

growth, why does this nation have only $217. in its state coffers? what in the world is going on? i should add that zimbabwe's finance minister later clarified that $30 million had been added to the government's account since he last spoke. but even that amount is pittance for a modern state. it is however, a telling symbol of zimbabwe status. imagine asking a multi-national company to invest in zimbabwe. transparency international puts this country at 163 in the world in its latest corruption rankings. the world bank ranks it 172nd for ease of doing business. zimbabwe has gone from being africa's bread basket to its basket case. the country's basic problem is not economic but political. zimbabwe has known only one real leader in all its existence.

robert mugabe. the man that helped the country gain independence in 1983. he will be 89 this february and he's made clear he wants to contest elections, once again this year. the man who could challenge him morgan tsvangirai is currently the prime minister. a post that was created in the last election in a power-sharing deal. but his power and influence is severely limited. mugabe and his party control many of the most important ministries, as well as the police and military. as with the last election, many observers expect violence, threats and bribery to influence how people vote. meanwhile, the ruling party continues to steal this poor country blind. in november, a canadian watchdog allege that more than $2 billion worth of diamonds have gone missing in zimbabwe since 2008. it's not just diamonds.

the same guy who raised the alarm about the state's finances told a newspaper last year that the mining sector produced exports totaling $2.5 billion in 2011. but only $150 million of that went to the government's official coffers. that's 94% of revenue missing and even the country's finance minister doesn't know what happened. where does this money go? average zimbabweans report of how $1 million was spent on the president's lavish 88 birthday last year. meanwhile, the national per capita income is barely more than a dollar a day. if elections this year were truly free and fair, i think we could expect big changes. i don't expect fair elections this year unless the world polices it very carefully. zimbabwe has disappeared from the front pages, but the tragedy in that country continues.

up next, one-on-one with the former vice president of america, al gore. [ male announcer ] when we built the cadillac ats from the ground up to be the world's best sport sedan... ♪ ...people noticed. ♪ the all-new cadillac ats -- 2013 north american car of the year. ♪ for a limited time, take advantage of this exceptional offer on the all-new cadillac ats. i'm up next, but now i'm singing the heartburn blues. hold on, prilosec isn't for fast relief. cue up alka-seltzer. it stops heartburn fast. ♪ oh what a relief it is!

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friend shot and killed at a gun range near ft. worth texas. the exs.e.a.l. was considered one of the military's best snipers. police have arrested eddie ray roth. there are reports roth was a troubled former marine kyle and his friend were trying to help. a news conference is scheduled later today. the alabama hostage standoff in its sixth day. today the school bus drive charles poland killed as he tried to protect the 5-year-old boy will be laid to rest. police are in communication with the alleged kidnapper jimmy lee dykes but won't say if he's making demands. pakistani teen activist ma la la yousafzai is in stable condition. the doctors say the operation was a success and she's awake and talking to family. she was shot in the head by taliban gunmen for speaking out for girl's education rights. in about 15 minutes we are investigating is north korea about to conduct another underground nuclear test? the whole world wants to know

what's going on. we get answers. fareed zakaria's "gps" continues right now. there's only one person in the world who has won a nobel prize, an oscar, a grammy and an emmy. he's not an actor or a singer, he is an environmental activist, a writer, a very successful businessman and he happens to be the former vice president of the united states. i am, of course, speaking of al gore. he has a fascinating new book out called "the future six drivers of global change." welcome back. >> thank you. good to be back. >> now, we could talk about everything and we will talk about the book, which is fascinating. but since i have you, so much we could cover. gun control. you and bill clinton passed the first big assault weapon ban. do you believe that that was responsible for your losses in the mid-term election, which has cast a shadow on the democratic party making even today conservative democrats or moderate democrats very

reluctant to embrace any kind of tough gun control laws? >> i think it was only one of many factors, fareed. others, including some with keen political minds have focused on that as a central element in the 2000 campaign. i think it was only one of many issues and i think that some have given it way too much responsibility for the result in 2000. i think that the tragedy at sandy hook school is really a watershed event that is likely to change the political discourse. i'm so hardened by the many pro-gun advocates who have said in heart felt terms, we need to make some changes. it still remains to be seen whether our political system can process this change. it's an open question and i certainly hope so and i am encouraged.

>> you would say to democrats, don't run away from this. you're not going to pay a price at the polls? >> i think the price, whatever price to be paid, it pales in comparison to the duty that they and all of us have to respond to this tragedy. >> you would support dianne feinstein's assault ban? >> absolutely. i think she's doing a terrific job. >> one of the things you talk about in the book, but, of course, we all have been witnessing the extreme weather phenomenon. >> yeah. >> you know, i was just wondering, since you've brought this issue up, we haven't really been able to do much in the united states, the european union has done something in terms of the kind of things you want to see, cap and trade or perhaps a carbon tax or things like that. china and india continue to add a coal-fired power plant essentially every week. so, do you look at that and say

this is -- climate change is going to happen, no matter what at this point? >> well, some climate change is already happening and will continue to happen. the physics of the problem are quite challenging. we put, well, 85% of the energy used by earth inc, it comes from fossil fuels. and the combustion of those fuels results in us putting 90 million tons of heat-trapping pollution into the atmosphere every day, as if it's an open sewer. it does obey the laws of physics. it traps enough extra energy every day to equal the amount in 400,000 hiroshima atomic bombs. and that's what's evaporating much more water off the oceans and filling the sky with a lot more water vapor and these great basins of water vapor in the sky are now filled or overflowing. you get the kind of downpours in my home city in nashville where

thousands of my neighbors lost their homes and businesses, had no flood insurance because it was a so-called once the a thousand year event. yesterday in australia, 2.5 feet of rain fell in queensland. all over the world these events are occurring with regularity because we have changed the climate. the good news is, you mentioned china and india. ipds india has passed a coal tax. that's a first step. china has put cap and trade in place for two cities and five provinces and has announced it is a pilot for a nationwide cap and trade system two years from now. >> but when you look at these measures that india and china are taking compared with the enormous increase in coal that they are using, it feels as though, you know, it's game over in the sense -- >> don't give up hope. first of all, we cannot afford that. we have to respond. the future of our civilization is at risk. half the north polar ice cap has disappeared.

look at superstorm sandy here. look at the 60% of the u.s. in drought. last year the hottest year in u.s. history. we have to stop this. we have to arrest it. >> the single biggest reason for the decline of co2 emissions in the united states or the decline in the rate of increase has been the substitution of natural gas and sort of coal. because of fracking, natural gas has become cheap enough that we're replacing coal. in fact, we are now doing better than the european union in terms of meeting targets. i've heard you on the subject and it feels to me like you're still very -- you're on the fence on the issue of fracking. shouldn't you be more fully in favor of it with regulations and with protections because it is almost everywhere replacing coal and that is a big net plus in terms of co2 emissions. >> we have to be careful in measuring the global warming

impact of the strategies that we choose. if you look at the latest satellite pictures of north america, there's a new ball of light as large as chicago in rural north dakota. what is that from? it's from the flaring of gas in the fracking operations. the amount of leakage of methane, along with the flaring, which presumably can be stopped, but it's not being stopped. the leak -- each molecule of methane is 70 times as powerful as a molecule of co2 over the short term. 10, 20 years or so and then it degrades to co2 or water. methane leakage may be occurring in sufficient quantities to outweigh the global warming advantages of switching from gas to coal.

so, i think that the fracking story needs to be written carefully. >> all right, we are going to come right back with al gore and i'll ask him about current tv and al jazeera. ♪ (train horn) vo: wherever our trains go, the economy comes to life. norfolk southern. one line, infinite possibilities. for those nights when it's more than a bad dream, be ready. for the times you need to double-check the temperature on the thermometer, be ready. for high fever, nothing works faster or lasts longer. be ready with children's motrin.

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and we are back with al gore, the former vice president of the united states, nobel peace prize winner and many

other things. you feel as though a combination of special interests and money have essentially completely corrupted democracy in america. >> functionally corrupted it, yes. you know, we're told that corporations are people that money is speech and that makes right. we know all those things are contrary to what the united states of america is all about. but, because our elected representatives now have to spend most of their time begging rich people to give them money, begging corporations and special interests to give them money, they spend more time worrying about the effect of their actions, votes and speeches on these big donors, some of them anonymous, than the time they should be spending thinking about how to serve the interests of the publics they represent.

>> you were in the senate. so, when you are raising all that money, it's gotten much worse since you were there, those people are expecting certain lines and regulatory codes, lines in the tax code, correct? they're not paying $50,000 to have breakfast with the congressman because of his personality? >> no, not at all. some of them still do that, i'm sure. but the request for a quid pro quo has become routinely far more brazen than was the case in the past. fund-raisers are often scheduled by special interests, according to the legislative calendar when particular bills come up. the same conversations involve legislation and fund-raising. now, there are exceptions. there are many honorable men and women, don't get me wrong. but there are good people trapped in a very bad system now.

>> you'd be for comprehensive campaign finance reform of some kind? >> absolutely. it is difficult to accomplish. both times i ran for president, my platform included 100% public financing for all federal elections. that's a tough thing to accomplish. but, we have got to get big money and anonymous donors and special interests. out of the it. they are now driving the political system. the congress now finds it virtually impossible to pass any kind of reform unless they first get permission from the special interests who are most involved with the issue involved and who finance their campaigns. and that's pitiful. >> current tv. a great business deal, but you started it because you wanted to create a greater, well, another liberal voice, a stronger one, an independent voice.

is this an endorsement of al jazeera and you're saying, al jazeera represents the same kind of traditions that you were al jazeera represents the same kind of traditions that you were trying to further when you founded current tv. >> well, i think al jazeera has, in fact, established itself as a highly respected international news gathering organization. it's won awards all over the world. it has a reputation for integrity and excellent reporting. i'm sure you watch al jazeera, english. >> you're talk about the english language channel, not the arabic language channel. >> al jazeera america promises to be even better still. >> butalgia wreer algi jazeerae solution. i am very pleased. i think the net result very positive for the america media

landscape. >> do you feel that president obama should use his second term to push through some of the things that he or you really believe in and how should he deal with the republicans, which has been the thornest problem he faces. >> of course, i do believe that he should move boldly on the agenda that he articulated in his inaugural address. i was very pleased that he put the climate crisis front and center, the first issue he brought up. a very bold commitment. he spent more words on that than any other issue. i was very happy about that. i think he will follow through. i think he has to follow through and there are some actions he can take that do not require congressional approval. there is a law on the books that requires the epa to regulate pollution. the supreme court has agreed with the obvious interpretation that global warming pollution is pollution. it's been applied to new coal plants and should be applied to

all facilities. >> and how would you deal with the issue of the republicans? there are people who say obama is not a lyndon johnson. he doesn't know how to maneuver. >> i think that he's learned a great deal during his first term. i don't want to sound patronizing in saying that. i've learned a great deal from watching his first term. but i think you already see a greater depth and sophistication in his approach. and i also think you are seeing on the gun issue, on the immigration issue, on the fiscal cliff issue a new wariness by republicans of the fire brands in their ranks who just want to stop everything. and i think that there is a new awareness that the american people don't want gridlock or sclerosis and it this

hyperpartisanship. one thing, i think, that president obama has demonstrated is an ability to reach across the aisle and to try to invite more cooperation, but he's now tempering that with a new firmness, as we saw in the fiscal cliff that i think will serve him in good step. >> al gore, always a pleasure. >> thank you. we will be back. [ engine revving ] ♪ [ male announcer ] every car we build must make adrenaline pump and pulses quicken. ♪ to help you not just to stay alive... but feel alive. the new c-class is no exception. it's a mercedes-benz through and through. see your authorized mercedes-benz dealer for exceptional offers through mercedes-benz financial services.

germany recently declared that it wants its gold back that it keeps at the new york federal reserve to be repatriated to frankfurt. that brings me to my question of the week from the gps challenge. how many total tons of gold are stored at the new york fed. is it "a" 670. "b" 1,300, "c" 6,700 or "d" 13,000. stay tuned, we'll tell you the correct answer. go to cnn.com/fareed for more of the gps challenge and follow us

on twitter and facebook. if you ever missed a show or a special, you can buy the video or get the audio for free. this week's book is alan blinders "after the music stopped." it is the single best and wisest book about the global financial crisis and its aftermath. blinder, who is a princeton professor and former vice chairman of the federal reserve challenges many resumptions and does it all in easy conversational pros. now, for the last look. take a look at this form 1040. americans know that's the form we all fill out to file our income taxes. but this one looks different? why? well, because it's an antique. today is the 100th anniversary of the 16th amendment which gave congress the right to levee a federal personal income tax. and this was the first form for filers when the filing deadline

was march 1st instead of april 15th and the top tax rate was, get this, 6% on incomes over half a million dollars. now, the original tax act, the piece of legislation was just 15 pages long. to more than 73,000 pages with all the rulings and regulations. now, we can't get rates back to the 1913 levels, but can we try to get back to something simple, straight forward and honest that, once again, would fit on 15 pages. the correct answer to the gps challenge question was "c," the new york fed said at last check 6,700 tons of gold in their vault. that is more than half million bars of the stuff and by our calculations, that's more than $300 billion worth of gold sitting below street level in lower manhattan. all of it is owned by the u